


brush your grey wings on my head

by silverfoxflower



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Angst with a Happy Ending, Birds, Discussion of Death, First Time, Haunting, M/M, Reincarnation, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:42:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28492578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silverfoxflower/pseuds/silverfoxflower
Summary: In this world, those who die a violent death are said to haunt their killers in the form of birds.For nine years, three months and fourteen days, Renfri's shrike has followed Geralt across the Northern Kingdoms.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Jaskier | Dandelion & Renfri | Shrike
Comments: 49
Kudos: 291
Collections: Holiday Horror 2020





	brush your grey wings on my head

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cat2000](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cat2000/gifts).



> Renfri is my absolute favorite ... I wasn't able to save her per se, but I hope you like my melancholic little tale.

In this world, those who die a violent death are said to haunt their killers in the form of birds.

For nine years, three months and fourteen days, Renfri's shrike has followed Geralt across the Northern Kingdoms. 

If she means to drive him mad, she is too unobtrusive - appearing infrequently to alight on the pommel of his sword or the top of his saddlebag, a small grey bird with bright eyes. Her chirps are soft and high, and if he stares too long in her direction she will dart away, a shadow in the sky. 

After the guilt, after those first few years after Blaviken where Geralt couldn't step foot in village limits without hostile stares and whispers, Geralt finds that he has grown used to her company. He's heard of men driven from cliffs by thick flurries of crows, buzzards that skulk about gallows, grimly feasting on the flesh of their former tormentors, songbirds which announce their killer's crime to all who can hear, driving them to madness with their constant song. In comparison, Renfri's shrike is a manageable nuisance. When Geralt leaves the cap of his waterskin open, she is happy to drop dead insects inside. That, thus far, has been the worst of it. 

"What do you think, Renfri?" he asks, bringing Roach to a slow stop at an intersection of paths. "West, or South?" 

The shrike lands on a branch within his sight, making it bob slightly under her weight. She inclines her head as if seriously considering his request before taking wing, flying down the road winding west. 

Geralt turns Roach towards the Southern branch. "There's no reason for her to act in our best interest," he tells Roach dryly, "the opposite, actually." 

When Renfri's shrike catches up to him in Leyda, she does not seem offended at his abandonment, though she does develop a habit of plucking Geralt's hair as he sleeps, weaving the silken white strands into those strange nests of hers. 

\--

"A shrike, huh," Jaskier says, observing Renfri as she settles to sleep on an out-of-reach branch, her feathers puffing out until she resembles nothing as much as a small ball of grey and black and white. "I would have thought you to have ... more than just the one." 

"Isn't one enough?" Geralt asks, bristling at Jaskier's implication that he deserves worse. 

"Well, with the whole story around Blaviken," Jaskier says, unfazed by Geralt's glare. "Wasn't there seven? Eight?" 

Geralt doesn't know why Renfri is the only one who follows him. There are no rules to this shit that he can understand. If there is any justice in the world, he figures, the Wizard Stregabor would be hounded from the top of his tower by the dozen or more princesses he had had a hand in killing. But so. 

"Have you tried driving her off?" Jaskier asks. 

"No," Geralt says sarcastically. "I haven't given it a single thought." He's spent years giving explanations and apologies ... he's pleaded, reasoned, and threatened. Nothing ever sways the stubborn little shrike, who always manages to find him, no matter how fast he travels or how far.

"I would think there are traps for these things," Jaskier says, and Renfri pops one eye open, considering him with irritation. "Perhaps you can engage the services of a falconer?" 

"Maybe _you_ can," Geralt says, bending his head over the broken tack he's mending. "And see if she switches her attentions to you." 

"Would the ghost of a bird ... also be a bird?" Jaskier muses. "Seems like rather circular logic, there." 

\--

As it turns out, Geralt is equally unsuccessful at driving off annoying bards. Another addition to the menagerie, he thinks dryly. 

\--

"What are you doing?" Geralt asks.

"I'm communicating with her," Jaskier says, whistling between his teeth. Renfri alights on the pommel of Geralt's sword in a flutter of feathers and cheerfully repeats the sound. 

"Hm," Geralt says, turning his gaze ahead.

"Aren't you curious to hear what she's saying?" Jaskier asks. 

"Yes," Geralt says, "but I doubt you know." 

"She told me that you have a small prick," Jaskier says, laughing when Geralt glares down at him. 

\--

Renfri, Geralt sees, has started plucking Jaskier's hair as well. 

It's strange to see the white and chestnut brown twined together among the grasses and twigs of her nests. 

\--

"... upon hearing of his Highness's impending marriage, the courtesan Delmidd begged to be slain by his king's own hand so that he might return as a dove rather than to be sent from his lover's side." 

"Moronic." 

"Well _I_ find it rather romantic," Jaskier says, snapping shut the thin volume of verses that he had paid an exorbitant sum for in the last town they travelled through. "What do you think, Renfri?"

Geralt can't see her reaction from his seat atop Roach, but he imagines that she is rolling her little bird eyes as hard as she can manage. 

"I wonder what manner of avian I would be," Jaskier says dreamily, tapping the spine of the book against his chin. "A nightingale, perhaps, a swift?" 

"Well, there's an easy way to find out," Geralt says dryly, "go get yourself murdered by the next Lord you cuckold." 

" _You_ would be a cock," Jaskier says loftily. "Melitele knows you already are." There is a flutter of wings, and suddenly Renfri is perched on the neck of Jaskier's lute, which is strapped to his back. Jaskier twists his head to look, then bursts into surprised laughter. "I think she agrees!" 

Geralt scowls.

\--

"What do birds eat, Geralt? Bread? I left some breadcrumbs out for Renfri but she doesn't seem interested."

"She's a shrike, Jaskier. She eats insects and ... small frogs I suppose."

"Ugh, I'm not getting _that_ for her!"

"... she's not a pet, Jaskier, she's a fucking ghost."

\--

Geralt is in Creyden, talking to the game warden about some girls who went missing in the local woods when he hears the flutter of wings, and a sharp pain as a chunk of his hair is yanked backwards.

"Hey!" Geralt barks, batting at Renfri, who is more agitated than he's ever seen her. She dives again, raking her small talons down the back of his hand before perching just out of reach, her feathers puffed in her ire.

Game warden Orlo looks uneasily from Geralt to Renfri. Geralt thinks of assuring him that it's not what it looks like, but that would be a lie.

"Should ... we move this inside?" Orlo asks, and Renfri _really_ doesn't like that idea, renewing her assault on Geralt so roughly that he's forced to throw up his hands to protect his face. It's comical, a heavily armored, heavily armed Witcher unable to fight off a small bird.

"What?" Geralt finally roars, " _What do you want?_ " and Renfri makes a sharp trilling noise that almost sounds ... like a whistle. Geralt thinks suddenly of Jaskier, who had promised to stay back at the inn.

Jaskier

_Jaskier_

"I have to go," Geralt says gruffly, and turns on his heel.

\--

Jaskier's body shakes with his coughing. There is blood - _too much blood_ \- down the front of his chest, plastering his shirt to his body. 

"Fuck," Geralt mutters, hauling Jaskier's weight as gently as he could manage, the woods cold and dark and endless around them. 

Which way? _Which way?_

"Please," Geralt mutters frantically, and a small shape darts ahead. Renfri, alighting on a branch that bobs before an overgrown path. She looks at Geralt and inclines her head, her eyes bright. 

Geralt holds Jaskier to him with cold, blood-slick hands and follows.

\--

Fifteen years, seven months and twenty-four days. 

Geralt kisses Jaskier, and Jaskier kisses him back, over-extending himself in his eagerness and disturbing his bandages. 

Renfri never appears again, but Geralt thinks of her often, the small bird in the dark woods, calling him forth with her sharp song. He feels a sense of loss at her absence that surprises him. Once, he even wanders into the woods to look for her, but calling for Renfri's return proves fruitless, and leaves him feeling like a fool.

"She did what she needed to do, I think," Jaskier says. "Hopefully she's in a better place now." 

Geralt almost asks Jaskier what it is that he thinks Renfri spent fifteen and a half years waiting to do, but refrains. No doubt his answer would be fanciful and foolish, when it's just as likely that Renfri was carried off by a passing owl. Jaskier is writing a new song. A tragic romance of star-crossed lovers who live on as cranes in the sky. From the snatches that Geralt has heard, it's actually quite good. He's debating whether to ever admit as such to Jaskier's face. 

"I'd be a lark, I think," Jaskier says on night, tucked against Geralt's arm under a bed of bright stars. 

"No," Geralt murmurs, pressing his lips against Jaskier's brow. "Stay with me on earth, you flightless thing."


End file.
